Sleepless Nights
by CykeclopsFF7
Summary: Another piece of the FF7 RPG Alternate Reality: Sean's venture into the ranks of Shin-Ra didn't turn out quite as he had planned. The company he thought was completely evil, had some interesting or good people in it that he couldn't quite destroy in his path as a double agent. What is Sean going to do now?


Midgar at midnight never seems different than Midgar noon. If you didn't know any better, you would swear we'd lived in day light continuum where the lights of day stretched on for days at a time. He looked over his shoulder at the unconscious form laying twisted within the bed sheets, contorted in a way such that he had no idea how she slept. He smiled slightly, and then went back to his flexing, folded hands, staring at the mirror in front of him. His reflection stared back at him menacingly, but he paid no attention to it. He rested his chin on his knuckles, and sighed heavily, looking vacantly into the mirror.

His planned "brief" stay with Shin-Ra had become increasing... complicated. His revenge never played out like it did in the novels of his dreams. He'd hit the evil bastard as hard and as cold as he pleased, each bullet giving him each moment of the life that Professor Hojo stole. His mother...his brother...The sanity of his father...He not only wanted them back. He wanted the sadist man gone to hell to rot and burn in eternal torment even after he screamed that he could endure no more. Turn about was really a part of tormentors fair play, wasn't it?

But it had gotten...complicated.

First of all, his relationship with the enigmatic Tseng, the leader of the Turks, was far more than he'd ever reckoned he'd deal with. Instead of finding all of the Turks sexual, drug-induced slobs, he managed to find that a few of them were responsible, if not friendly. Tseng had been one in that category, and even found himself admiring the man for his manipulative schemes and his ability to play both sides of the cantankerous war with Shin-Ra and the rebel group to his own liking. He had planned to be a spy within the Shin-Ra itself for himself, hating the rebel group with its connection to his lecherous father, and loathing the Shin-Ra with its knack for underhanded tactics and human experimentation. He found himself benefiting from Tseng's tactics, and especially the information that had arisen from it. Tseng had, in fact, benefited from Sean's ability to know thing not just from the Shin-Ra, but from the rebel group as well. Sean had begun to trust the man, to the point that it seemed like a circle of trust had begun to form between the man's longstanding girlfriend, Elena, himself, Sean, and his own wife, Chase. Each of them had another motive for being within Shin-ra ranks, and yet that somehow formed a bond of trust between the four, distinguishing them as true patrons of some espionage saints, instead of lecherous heretics who's only interest in the job, itself, was narcistic sexual and drunken pleasures. He wasn't supposed to be making friends, and had entertained the thought that he would hate every single one of them. Much to his dismay and his pleasure, he found himself as more of a student, learning from the man's guile, and seeing him as a unexpected mentor.

But that wasn't the only complication...He swiveled his chair and stared for a long moment at the red head sleeping soundly within the tangle of sheets. Her red hair spilled across the white sheets, like an avalanche of red waterfalls. He serenely smiled, for the first time in days, wishing that he could join her, but the demons of sleepless worry dragged on into the night.

Her. Where the did she fall into this equation? His thoughts drifted back to that old sentiment that he would make any sort of acquaintance, let alone a wife, in Shin-Ra. But she was different... She had entered the ranks as a drunken, whore-ish woman, who turned out to be raging alcoholic in need of stabilization. A boat in the thick of stormy seas. She had cleaned up her attitude, and slowly, he began to seeing her. She was one of the last remaining Ancients: A rare race of being that had come under the scrutiny of Shin-Ra, and especially, Professor Hojo. His thoughts turned darker upon the intrusion of the man's name. Professor Hojo, in his quest for utter scientific and biological dominance, had done many, many crimes against humanity and the other races that have and had once lived upon this aged planet, and a horrible fixation upon the Ancients and the creature once known as "the crisis from the skies." His brows furrowed and his eyes flashed a look of hot lightning across a midnight sky. He loved his wife, desperately, and protecting her was his utmost priority, even if he had to cross all of heaven and hell to do it and fight the devil, himself.

The devil himself was the sick, deprived scientist that somehow managed to experiment on both his mother and brother, and drove his father to drinking. He would kill him, even if he died trying, but then-What would happen to her?

He slumped in his chair and covered his eyes with the palm of his hand. How had it come to this...

A neon sign buzzed outside of their lone window, and he brought his fingers to a pinch on the bridge of his nose. His brother...his mother...what would they say? He was supposed to be watching his brother that day when it happened...They were down by the shore...He squeezed his eyes tightly together. He was teasing him as his brother was afraid to go down to the dilapidated dock where their ball had bounced. Finally being harassed enough to get it, the last Sean saw of him was his blonde head bobbing as he went down beyond the hill to get it. His brother screamed, and he raced down there, almost stumbling through the sand to reach his brother. The soldiers had one hand over his mouth, and his arm restraining his brother's body. Two other soldiers blocked him from the one carrying his brother. Just as Sean arrived, the two soldiers stepped up to him. What he remembered next was the coldness of the bayonet across his chest, and the sound of pounding footsteps getting further and further away.

The breath in and out of his lungs felt like an icy winter wind. His chest ached and burned like heat of the desert, and he felt his hand unconsciously reach under his shirt, to feel the expansive scar that reached from his left hip to his right shoulder. The wheels of the chair beneath him were squeaking, they were being shaken so hard. He heard something rustle behind him, and turned quickly to see the covers fall from Chase's chest, looking at him in concern.

"Maybe...you should come to bed..." She said softly.

He shook his head and managed a small smile back at her. "I'll be ...fine." He extended his hand.

She looked at him with tired eyes. "Sean...you never sleep..."

He couldn't deny it. He knew it was true. He only slept a few hours each night. The nightmares were like revisiting hell over and over again.

She cocked her head at him, and he sighed as he slowly rose from his chair and walked toward the bed. She softly wrapped her arms around his shoulders and he reached over to turn off the light.

"Maybe it will be better tonight..." She whispered as he laid down next to her.

"...perhaps, it will." 


End file.
